I have finished Day 1 of the USDF Instructor Workshop on Lungeing with Christin Rivlin at Promontory Equestrian Center in Park City, Utah.

After working the horses at home, I left on a 6 p.m. flight last night. Several hours and a layover in Denver later, I landed in Salt Lake City, Utah at 12 p.m. there time.

When my alarm went off at 6 a.m., I was welcomed with a view of the most spectacular mountains out my Holiday Inn window. Driving to Park City, I almost could not believe the difference between the mountains and the flat area between them. It almost reminds me of a bad movie set where they use a backdrop... only this was definitely real.

My experience at the Equestrian Center was just as surreal. We enjoyed an hour lecture inside the heated lounge/viewing area, with a roaring fire and full breakfast spread. Some of us sat back in deep leather arm chairs while we watched instructional videos.

Then we spent the rest of the day lungeing... in their HEATED indoor ring. Take that Florida!

Seriously. Pinch me.

I drive 70 miles round trip each day, which leads me to wonder what "driving" habits I bring to the farm with me.

Most obvious, is the infamous chair seat. If I don't pay attention to my position, I find my torso caving in and my hip flexors tightening so that I can be in that nice fetal position our cars... and office chairs... allow us to comfortably acquire for hours at a time.

Hitting the brake and expecting an immediate response is another. Our cars don't need a warning tap to let them know we are about to ask for them to slow down. The same does not apply to our horses!

On the opposite side, I keep my foot firmly pressed on the gas pedal at all times... unless I am slowing. My horse, on the other hand, should not require that I keep the forward aid at all times. If I ask my horse to go forward into trot, he should stay in trot until I apply the slowing aid... not when I relax the driving aid.

Let us never forget steering with our hands! My horse will not turn properly from just my hands and my car will not turn properly from my seat and legs.

Lastly, we must remember the habits we can happily keep in both driving and horse riding... safety. Having been in some pretty hairy car and riding accidents, I am always the first to advocate safety equipment. Seat belts and riding helmets have saved my life and should be worn whenever possible.

Now, if only we could figure out how to more efficiently clean up after both!

Some of you may know that I have a Journalism background (resulting in a strong urge to edit things). This habit has carried over to my riding and I find it extremely useful to improving my riding when I am not in the saddle.

Most often on my day off, I find myself going over my rides and thinking about the moments I struggled with. With Barb's instructions of how to work through it in my head, I visualized the correct way to ride these difficult parts of my previous rides.

While it is true that nothing beats time in the saddle, I can promise you that my riding has improved most after a lesson AND after a day off where I can process what I learned in that lesson.

Tip #1: Write down what you learned in your lesson and WHY it was important to improving your ride.

Tip #2: Visualize yourself, doing what you were taught to improve. Using each step of what you were told to change, create a picture of a new you. With your new you, imagine yourself successfully riding through the tough times of your ride... and everything going perfectly.

If you are a "feeler" then think about how it feels to ride through as your new you. A visual person can imagine what it looks like from the horse and as a spectator.

Exercise: Ride EVERY stride of a line straightly.

For example, instead of looking at C and riding for it down centerline, follow the imaginary line from A to X to C through your horses ears and keep them on that line every stride. At any moment, your horse should be exactly the same distance from both long sides.

Note: That you have to keep all of your aids ready all of the time. By paying attention to where you are, you should also be able to fix your horses wiggly much sooner... instead of getting back on track as you approach X, you will be staying on track the entire time. By looking through your horse's ears, you will also notice if he is staying steady in his frame.

Apply: Pick an EXACT distance to stay off the track and ride your warmup on that inside track. At any moment, you should be able to measure your hoof marks and find that they are within inches of that selected distance. Remember to follow the selected line through your horse's ears.

Continue to do the same on perfect 20-meter circles and diagonals. Remember to focus on the imaginary dotted line from each point, through your horse's ears.

Confirm that you know how to ride the points of the following:

20-meter circle in the center: Hit at E, 2 meters before I on the centerline, B, 2 meters before L on the centerline.

20-meter circle on the ends: Hit at C/A, 4 meters after M/H/K/F on the track, 2 meters past I/L on the centerline.

Diagonals: HXF, KXM

 

With Barbara heading to Florida, Lauren and I are "taking over" while she is away. Most importantly, I will be keeping her horses in training. In preparation, Barb and I have been working together with all of the horses... so throughout the week, I watch her lessons and she works me through riding all of her horses so I know what to focus on.

This means that I have been riding (in lessons, no less!) almost all of her horses and all of my horses in training! I LOVE it and feel like my riding has matured by about 3 years in a month!

But... Saturday morning, I felt like I could barely lift my arms. Let alone ride in a lesson. The warmup was not so great and I finally rode through it, but it wasn't award-winning :/

Learning experience of the day: When I got on the next horse, I felt fine! My muscles felt somewhat loose and warmed up and I could actually ride!

I was reminded of something I learned from a baseball pitcher. His coach told him, the day after he had pitched a hard game, to run. Why? To release the lactic acid buildup from his pitching muscles with exercising less-used/tired muscles.

My new goal, tip for myself: After days that I know my butt is getting kicked, make sure to exercise before I get on my first horse. Not just warmup, but exercise until I feel loose... I will report back when I figure out how much that means. Maybe running to the barn in the morning (just kidding! That is 35 miles!).

If you scroll down my blog page, you will see a post I wrote about writing down what aids you need for each movement at your level.

Imagine my surprise when Barb asked me to explain the difference between shoulder and haunches in just the other day. (Hint: We ride them with the same aids, it is just a matter how much pressure you apply on each aid).

Which leads me to my newest thought: Once you have confirmed that you know the aids for all of your movements, write down common mistakes your body makes when trying to apply the correct aids and how to get from movement 1 to 2, 2 to 3, and so on through the test. This will allow you to really know what you need to do and also NOT do through the test.

These 3 activities allow you to ride a cleaner test.

For example in shoulder to haunches in, instead of thinking about aids for the shoulder in to all of the aids for haunches in, I can simply think:

Shoulder-in = inside leg at the girth, weight inside seatbone, outside knee and calf, reins softly hold the inside bend.

Shoulder-in to haunches-in = less outside knee, more outside calf. NOT all aids above, with that illusive "thinking" haunches-in instead of shoulder-in aid.